Shinichi's Return
by Detectivewriters
Summary: When Conan finds out surprising news on the TV, he immediately rushes over to tell Professor Agasa. However, Haibara is waiting there with an untested antidote for him. An antidote with a very . . . remarkable side effect.
1. Prologue

_Hello everyone! This is Detectivewriters! Btw, most of the chapters will be longer than this prologue. Around twice as long. Hope you enjoy!_

* * *

**Prologue**

It was a slow Saturday and Conan was watching the TV with eyes half closed, bored. There was nothing else he could do, after all. No cases had come in, all the members of the Detective Boys were busy, he didn't feel like re-reading any of his books and Subaru was in his house anyway so it wasn't like he could get any from there, and he just didn't feel like going to the Professor's house. Everyone else had gone off somewhere, leaving Conan home alone. Suddenly, the theme music of the news channel came on. Well, maybe something interesting would come out of it.

"THE FBI HAVE DISCOVERED AND DECIPHERED A MYSTERIOUS LETTER BELONGING TO A DANGEROUS ORGANIZATION IN JAPAN," the TV blared.

"Eh?" Conan said. This was definitely more interesting than any of the other things that had been on.

"APPARENTLY THE FBI HAD BEEN TRACKING THIS ORGANIZATION FOR A WHILE NOW. AN ORGANIZATION THAT STRICTLY WEARS BLACK."

"Eh?!" Conan exclaimed. "D-don't tell me . . ."

"BUT THERE'S NO MORE NEED TO WORRY, AS ALL THE MEMBERS OF THAT BLACK ORGANIZATION HAVE BEEN CAPTURED AND THE NEW POISON THEY HAD CREATED CONFISCATED."

"Nani? How come I didn't know of this?" Conan listened for a few more minutes, but nothing more of that Black Organization was mentioned. "Well, I should at least tell the professor about this . . ." he said. Then he turned off the TV, got his shoes on, and skateboarded down to Professor Agasa's house.

When he got there, Conan burst into the house exclaiming, "Agasa-hakase!"

"Ah!" Professor Agasa said as he dropped the gadget he was working on. "W-what is it, Shinichi?"

"Did you see the news?!" he asked.

Haibara walked into the room. Kudo-kun was obviously excited about something.

"No, I didn't. Why? What was on it?"

"The FBI captured that organization!"

"EH?!" both Haibara and the professor exclaimed.

Conan nodded his head, out of breath from rushing over there and telling the professor about what he had seen.

"T-that's great, Shinichi!" Professor Agasa said. "Then that means that you can tell Ran who you really are then!"

Conan was grinning. Finally, _finally_, he wouldn't have to hide from Ran anymore. He could step out and say it without being afraid of putting her in any danger. He was about to turn around to go home and wait for Ran to return when Haibara stopped him.

"Kudo-kun," she started quietly.

"Huh?" he asked, turning around.

"Wouldn't you like to tell her as yourself?" she explained.

Conan was confused, "What do you mean?"

"Wouldn't you like to tell her as Shinichi, not Conan?"

"Then, you found the antidote?!"

"It hasn't been tested on humans yet."

"Oh, so I'm just your guinea pig again." But the others had worked fine, even if temporary, so why shouldn't this one? "Alright, just give it to me so that I can hurry and tell Ran."

"Aa," she replied, leaving to get the antidote. While she was gone Conan left to get some clothes for when he turned back into Shinichi. Haibara gave him the antidote and he went into the bathroom to change, both into Shinichi and into his new clothes.

After a few seconds, Haibara and Professor Agasa heard Conan's voice from inside the bathroom, but they couldn't make out what he was saying. First, there was surprise and confusion, but then it seemed like he was arguing with himself about something. Except one side of his argument was slightly different somehow. The two looked at each other confused. Suddenly, his voice stopped and he came out of the bathroom.

Or rather, _they_ came out of the bathroom.

"Ehhh?!" the professor and Haibara exclaimed.

Together, side-by-side, both with confused looks on their faces, Conan and Shinichi walked up to the two surprised inventors.


	2. Conan & Shinichi!

_Hello again! Decided to post the prologue and the first chapter at the same time. Tell me what you think please! _

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Shinichi looked around the room and spotted Haibara right next to Professor Agasa. "Agasa-hakase," he ventured, "Who are these children?"

Haibara stared at the two with wide eyes. That wasn't supposed that happen. That _couldn't_ happen. It was impossible. But then again, she would've thought it impossible for someone to shrink back into a grade schooler. But that happened. Twice. Furthermore this Shinichi seemed to have lost some of his memories.

Professor Agasa didn't respond. He _couldn't_ respond. He was dumbstruck at the two figures before him. So Haibara filled in for him by completely ignoring the question and asking, "What do you last remember, Kudo-kun?"

Conan opened his mouth to respond, but the look in Haibara's eyes told him not to. Instead, he let his teenaged self reply. "Wait, who are you?"

"I'll answer your question after you answer mine," she replied.

"Geez, so bossy," he muttered to himself. Then he replied, "Fine. The last thing I remember is leaving Ran to go check out a suspicious man in black. Then I turned up here in the bathroom with this boy. I have no idea what just happened."

_This is so weird,_ Conan thought to himself, _He has all the same memories as me, up until I was attacked. But he technically _is_ me . . ._

"Now can you answer my question?"

Haibara looked up at Professor Agasa to see if he was ready to answer Shinichi's question. The look on his face told her he wasn't. She sighed and answered his question. "I'm Haibara Ai. Professor Agasa is taking care of me for the time being. Next to you is Edogawa Conan-"

"Eh?!" Shinichi exclaimed, "Those are the names of mystery writers!"

"Heh heh," Conan said, getting the message not to tell himself about himself, "my parents were big mystery fans."

"Anyway," Haibara continued, "He's your distant relative."

"Huh?" Shinichi asked, "He is? Really? Interesting."

"I'm staying at Ran-neechan's house!" Conan added.

"Eh? Why?"

"Because I couldn't stay with you in your house because you were in the hospital for a little while to make sure you were all right and then went off to solve a whole bunch of cases."

"Nani?!" Shinichi exclaimed. "I was?!"

Finally getting over his speechlessness, Professor Agasa went along with Conan's story. "Aa. Once you were hit in the head by that man in black, you were taken to the hospital and stayed there for a few hours. Then you got caught up in a case that happened in a different town and just start solving case after case. There wasn't really much time for you to come back, unfortunately. But you just did to surprise Ran."

"But, I don't remember any of this," Shinichi said. "I told you the last thing I remember was waking up in the bathroom.

"Oh yeah! I remember!" Conan spoke up. "While in the bathroom you fell down and must've hit your head on something hard. That must've made you lose that part of your memory."

"Oh, I see now," Shinichi said.

"I'll call the hospital and tell them that! They might want you to come back," Conan said, running into the next room so he wouldn't be heard.

"Chotto matte!" Shinichi called after him, "Professor Agasa should do something like that!"

"N-no," the professor said, not quite sure what Conan was up to, "It's alright. He was the one that saw you fall in the first place so it'd be better if he called them."

"But he's just a kid!" Shinichi replied, "I'm not sure they'll listen to him."

"No, don't worry, Shinichi. It's fine."

"Hm . . ." the detective still wasn't convinced.

Suddenly, Conan poked his head back in and said, "Oh, I forgot to tell you, Shinichi-niichan. Before you lost your memory, you said that Subaru-san could live in your house for the time being." Then he went back into the other room.

"W-wait, I said what? Someone's living in my house?"

Over in the next room, Conan ignored his older self and made a call not to the hospital, but next door, to Subaru-san.

_"Moshi moshi,"_ Subaru said through the phone.

"Kon'nichiwa, Subaru-san," Conan replied.

_"Conan-kun?"_

"Um, Subaru-san?" Conan said, "Shinichi surprised us and suddenly came back. But the thing is, he lost his memory. So he doesn't remember letting you stay in his house."

_"Huh? Well, that's . . . unexpected. Do you want me to move out?"_

"W-well, you don't need to do that. It's just that you should know that you and Shinichi will probably be living together for now. And he won't know who you are."

_"Ah, I see. Well, thank you for telling me then, Conan-kun."_

"Umn!" Conan replied. Then he hung up and went into the room that everyone else was gathered in. He told everyone that the doctors said that it was okay for Shinichi to stay at home as long as they kept an eye on him. Shinichi looked worried.

Suddenly, they heard a knock on the door. "Conan-kun!" Ran called, "Are you here? It's time to go home!"

"Ran!" Shinichi said, and he went over to open the door for her.

Ran waited in front of the front door of Professor Agasa's house. She knew Conan had to be here. She saw him leaving the detective agency on her way back and, after dropping off the groceries, remembered that there were a couple books that she needed to get for her English class. So on the way back from getting them from the bookstore, she decided to get Conan so she could make dinner.

"Coming!" she heard Conan say. Then he added something that she couldn't quite make out, but she thought she heard "wait up" and "one".*

When the door opened, Ran stared across in shock and surprise. Her books hit the ground with a thud. Then she recovered and flung her arms around Shinichi, calling his name. Shinichi looked at her in surprise. He hadn't expected this reaction from her. He must've been gone for a long time. So he hugged her back.

Conan looked up at the two with a mixture of feelings. Sure, there was happiness from seeing Ran smile at the return of Shinichi, but he thought that there was another feeling there that made him not quite like this reunion. Could it be . . . jealousy?

When the two separated, Ran said, "You didn't tell me you were coming back!"

"W-well," Shinichi replied.

"Did you want to surprise me or something?"

"Um, I don't know. Maybe."

"Huh?" Ran asked.

Conan stepped forward and said, "Ran-neechan . . ."

"Yeah, Conan-kun?"

"Shinichi-niichan lost his memories."

"Eh?!" Ran exclaimed. She looked to Shinichi for confirmation.

He nodded his head and replied, "The last thing I remember is following a suspicious man in black. One of the people on the rollercoaster with us when we went to Tropical Land."

"B-but . . ." she trailed off. She didn't know what to say.

"Gomen'nasai . . . Ran," Shinichi said.

"Iie, it's okay," Ran replied. "Anyway, you should go back home. It's getting late. Conan-kun, let's go back home so we can cook you dinner."

Conan glanced sidelong at Shinichi, "Demo . . ." he said.

"A-actually," Shinichi said, "I just found out that someone's been living in my house. I'm not quite sure if I'm ready to go back or not."

Conan looked at Ran, then Shinichi. "Ne," he spoke up, "can Shinichi-niichan stay with us at Ran-neechan's house?"

"Eh?" Ran and Shinichi replied.

"N-no, I can stay at Professor Agasa's house," Shinichi added.

"Then, can I stay as well?" Conan asked Ran.

"Huh?" Ran asked. Then she added, eyes narrowed slightly, "You just want to stay with Shinichi, don't you?"

"Eheheh," Conan replied, "I haven't seen him for a long time."

"Mou, neither have I, Conan-kun."

"So can I?"

Ran hesitated and Professor Agasa spoke up, "Don't worry, Ran. I'll take care of him."

She sighed, then said, "Alright, Conan-kun."

"Arigatou gozaimasu, Ran-neechan!" Conan replied.

* * *

_*The last part of Shinichi's name, "ichi" means "one" in Japanese. _

_Just saying, some of the things Shinichi says and does will probably be out of character. 1) Because Shinichi's personality before turning into Conan hasn't been shown much, and 2) I can only guess how he would respond to certain events that have never happen to "old" Shinichi. I'm pretty sure that other characters are ooc as well. _


	3. Strange, Very Strange

_Hello, everyone! I'm back with another chapter. It might be a bit more interesting, but that depends on the person. Hope you like it! _

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Chapter 3: Strange. Very Strange: 

When Ran left, Conan, Shinichi and Professor Agasa went back inside, Shinichi hoping that one of the two children could cook, Conan hoping that Haibara would make something good for dinner and Professor Agasa hoping that Haibara would go a little easy on his diet. They were all satisfied . . . except for Professor Agasa. He sighed as he sat down to Haibara's low-fat curry dinner. At least it still tasted okay.

After dinner, Shinichi went upstairs to pick which room he wanted. He was leaving one of the rooms when he heard a voice coming up the stairs into the hallway. It was that kid, Edogawa-kun's, voice. Shinichi was about to say hi to the kid when he caught the serious tone in his voice. For some reason, he felt like he should hide and listen in secret to what Edogawa-kun was saying.

"-Kudou-kun know?" That was the little girl's voice, Shinichi could make out. And she seemed to be talking about him. He decided to hide a little farther into the room.

"I don't know, but not much." Edogawa-kun again. "Definitely not about Sleeping Kogoro or anything like that."

_Sleeping Kogoro?_ Shinichi thought, _What's that?_

"He'll eventually find out," Haibara warned, "He _is_ a detective, after all."

"I know, I know. How could I not know? He's m-" Shinichi winced as he accidentally knocked something off the shelf he was near when he was trying to get closer to hear more clearly what the two were saying. However, they heard the noise and immediately became quiet as they passed by the door and went into another room. Shinichi heard their muffled voices again, but it was in a tone completely different than before and not nearly as serious. They probably wouldn't be talking about this anymore tonight.

The next morning, Conan woke up anxious that his older self hadn't heard too much of their conversation. He was sure that it had been Shinichi in that room. The professor was downstairs and Haibara was right next to him. And even if it had been Professor Agasa, he would've made a noise after dropping whatever had fallen on the floor, unlike someone who was listening in on a conversation and wouldn't want to be heard. Also, it would be what Conan would do.

The shrunken detective sat up in bed and looked around for his fake glasses. He could obviously still see without them, but with Shinichi around he didn't want to take any chances. However, he couldn't find them. He searched all over the room, high and low, but still couldn't find them. Shrugging, he got dressed and headed downstairs to find the extra pair that Professor Agasa had made for him.

However, when he reached the bottom of the stairs and went into the kitchen, he saw Shinichi eating cereal while examining both pairs of glasses. He took his gaze off the glasses and turned to look at Conan.

"These are nifty little glasses you have here," he remarked.

"Heh heh," Conan replied, "But Shinichi-niichan, can I have them back? It's hard to see without them . . ."

"Oh, here you go," Shinichi replied, handing Conan one of the pairs. However, Conan noticed, he still held onto the other pair. "How did you get them like this?" he added, pressing the zoom button on them.

"Uh, Professor Agasa added to them like that. You suggested it."

Shinichi looked somewhat surprised. "I did, huh?" he said to no one in particular.

"Unm."

"I wonder why?"

"Um," Conan replied, thinking quickly, "for the Detective Boys."

"Detective Boys?"

"Unm. The Detective Boys is a group at my school. Haibara and I are part of it, along with three of our friends. Professor Agasa has also made a few other things for us, like these." He held up his detective badge, which he always kept with him just in case.

"Naruhodo," Shinichi replied. Then he added, "Well, you better hurry up and eat so that I can bring you back over to Ran's house."

"Hai!" Conan said.

After breakfast and leaving a note for Professor Agasa, Shinichi lead Conan out of the professor's house and started walking toward the Mouri Detective Agency. Shinichi asked him various questions on the way there concerning what had happened before he lost his memory, and Conan replied according to the makeshift story he had come up with for Shinichi the night before.

When they arrived, Conan opened the door saying, "Tadaima!"

"Okaeri!" they heard Ran call back as they entered the apartment.

"Hey, Ran!" Shinichi said when he heard her.

"Shinichi!" Ran replied, surprised, "What are you doing here?"

"Just dropping the kid off," he said, "And since you apparently haven't seen me in a while, I decided to visit as well."

Ran smiled, "Arigatou, Shinichi." Suddenly, the doorbell rang. "Oh, I'll get it," she added, walking over to see who it was. When she opened the door, Ayumi was there waiting.

"Hi, Ran-san," she said, "is Conan-kun here?"

"Hai," Conan replied, walking up to her.

"Oh, hey Conan-kun! Do you want to play soccer with Genta, Mitsuhiko and I? Haibara said she couldn't come."

"Hm? Soccer?" Shinichi asked, walking up to them.

"Yeah," Ran replied, "Conan-kun likes soccer as well, just like you."

"Oh really?" Shinichi asked, looking down at his younger self. Conan smiled innocently at him.

When they left the detective agency to head toward where Genta and Mitsuhiko were waiting at the park, Ayumi asked, "Ne, Conan-kun, wasn't that Shinichi-san?"

"Huh? Oh, hai!" Conan responded after being interrupted from his thoughts about Shinichi, "He came back a little while ago."

"Huh? Really?"

"Yeah. But, he lost part of his memory."

"Eh?!"

"Ne, Ran," Shinichi ventured after the two had left. The two were sitting down in the kitchen after Ran made tea. "What happened after I left at Tropical Land?" He already knew some things, of course, from Conan, but there may have been some things that he had forgotten. Or his memories were messed with because of his opinion on things.

"Hm," Ran said, thinking, "Well, besides Conan coming and you solving cases, there's Sleeping Kogoro."

"Sleeping Kogoro?" Shinichi asked. _That sounds familiar_ . . . he thought, _Wait, didn't Conan say something about that last night?_ "What's that?" he added.

"After you left, my dad seemed to regain his touch on detective work. Sometimes, he still tries to solve cases normally, but they don't usually end up working. However, after a case gets to a certain point, everything suddenly becomes clear to him, he makes a weird noise and falls into a sleeping pose. Then he explains his deduction and gets it right every time. Now he's a famous detective."

"Really? _Him?_" Then Shinichi remembered something. "Wait, what do you mean, 'he makes a weird noise'?" he added.

"Well, sometimes it's a yawning noise, sometimes it sounds like 'uwaaaa'. It's different every time, but it always fits into the sleeping pose."

"Hmmm," Shinichi said. "I'd like to see him like that sometime."

"You just missed it. He solved a case a few days ago."

"Hm," Shinichi replied. He looked around himself and spotted something on the floor right outside the door. "What's this?" he muttered to himself as he kneeled down and picked it up.

"Oh, that?" Ran replied. "That's Conan's bowtie. That's strange, he always has it with him. He must have dropped it when Ayumi brought him out."

"Naruhodo," Shinichi replied. He turned around the red bowtie and what he saw surprised him. There were small gears on the inside. He tried turning a few. Nothing happened. He whispered something to himself and noticed that the bowtie had changed his voice. Hm, according to Ran, Conan always kept this voice-changing bowtie with him. He also always kept his glasses, with their strange improvisations, with him as well. Strange. Very strange.

* * *

_And thus starts Shinichi's suspicions._


	4. The Bowtie

_Hello everyone! Sorry for the late update and short chapter. I had writer's block for a little while and then the end here seemed like a good place to stop. _

_Well, here's the next chapter! _

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Chapter 4: The Bowtie:

Shinichi's was brought out of his speculations back into reality by Ran's voice. "What did you say?" he asked. He hadn't heard what she said before.

"I said," Ran replied, "Now that I think about it, Inspector Yamamura was eventually able to get a video of dad's Sleeping Kogoro act. He sent it to us and I was wondering if you wanted to look at it."

"Oh, really? Can I see it?"

"Sure, I'll go get it for you."

"Okay," Shinichi replied, sitting down. He decided to play a little bit with the bowtie. He wondered how many settings it had, but it looked like more than any normal voice changer. He decided to try one. He spoke into it, but the only thing that happened was a slight echo repeating what he said. That was strange; he could've sworn that it had changed his voice before. He decided to try another setting. Yes, it definitely changed his voice, this time into a girl's voice. It sounded familiar but he couldn't quite place it . . . Ah, yes! It was Sonoko's. That was weird; why would Conan's voice changer have a setting that sounded exactly like Sonoko's voice? He tried a few more and was able to identify various friends and acquaintances among other random voices, including Professor Agasa's and Detective Mouri.

Then he came back to that one setting and tried it again. No voice changing. Could it be broken? Then it hit him. Many of these voices were of those that he, or rather Conan, knew. So why wouldn't there be one of his, Shinichi's? But why would Conan even have a voice changer with settings exactly like the voices of those that he knew? Shinichi didn't think that the normal voice changers that you could buy were able to do that. This just kept getting more and more confusing.

Shinichi looked up as Ran came back into the room and set up the video, but he wasn't really paying attention. His mind was focused on the new mystery at hand. Suddenly, his phone buzzed. He took it out and flipped it open. It was Conan saying that he forgot something and was coming back to get it. Shinichi looked back down at the bowtie. That was probably what he was coming back for.

He looked up at the video Ran had put on and for the first time really paid attention to it. Mouri was now giving the evidence about why the suspect was the murderer. He watched the culprit collapse onto his knees and confess to his crime.

"Wait," he said, "your dad did that?"

"Unm," Ran said, nodding her head almost proudly.

"Well, it was probably just a lucky guess."

"Iie, not at all," Ran replied. "He's been solving cases like that for a while now."

"Since when?"

"Well, now that I think about it, since you left."

"Hm . . ." Shinichi muttered. However, he was so focused on his thoughts that he failed to notice the door open and Conan come through.

Conan looked around for his bowtie on the floor but couldn't find it anywhere. Where could he have left it then? He hoped Ran didn't find it. If she did and discovered the voice changer in it, she would probably start suspecting him again. Conan did another quick scan and found it . . . in Shinichi's hand. He almost started to panic but managed to not show it on the outside. Shinichi finding the bowtie was much worse than Ran finding it.

Nobody seemed to notice that Conan had come back - Ran was focused on the video of Sleeping Kogoro (great, now Shinichi knew about that as well) and Shinichi seemed lost in his own thoughts - so he called out "Tadaima!" Conan's voice suddenly calling out startled Shinichi out of his thoughts and he accidentally dropped his cellphone. "Ah! Gomen'nasai, Shinichi-niichan!" Conan said, running over to where Shinichi was bent down, observing the damage to his phone. Conan saw his chance and grabbed his bowtie before Shinichi could notice it. Then he tried to help him with the phone, but was shooed away. "Fine then," Conan muttered to himself, then out loud he said, "Itekimasu!" and left to go back to play soccer.

Shinichi sighed when he realized that the fall had partially broken his phone. He couldn't see anything on the part of the screen where the time and other things were. Oh well, he could always ask Professor Agasa to fix it.

He decided to try to do a little more experimentation with Conan's bowtie, but when he looked around, he couldn't find it. He groaned when he realized that that kid had probably taken it when he had come back.

"What's wrong?" Ran asked when he heard him.

"Oh, it's just that my phone broke," Shinichi covered up. This was to be a secret investigation.

"Then we should get you a new one."

"Yeah, I will soon," he replied absently, shifting back into his thoughts again.

"Mou, why are you acting so spacey recently?" Ran asked to no one in particular. She had noticed how he wasn't really paying attention to the Sleeping Kogoro video, even if he was a little surprised at the end. And then right away he was spaced out again. So spaced out that he had jumped when he heard Conan's "tadaima". There was something on his mind, and Ran was determined to find out what.

* * *

_Conan's in trouble . . . and so is Shinichi. _

_And I won't be posting for a few weeks. Gomen. Ja ne! _


	5. In the Middle of the Night

_**Konbanwa! Sorry for not updating for so long. I've been working on other fanfics and probably won't update for a while since I'm still working on a murder case for one of them. Aoyama-sensei, I don't know how you can come up with them almost every week (and I'm still waiting for the next chapter to update . . . please finish your research and write/draw the next chapter soon!) **_

_**Anyway, I'm back with another chapter and Shinichi is still confused about Conan. Oh yeah, I'm working on a cover photo for this story as well. It just needs to be colored in. **_

_**So here's the next chapter, which takes place in the middle of the night . . . **_

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Chapter 4: In the Middle of the Night:

Ran and Shinichi spent the day together. Not sure about where to go, Shinichi suggested to go to Tropical Island. But before he could finish the sentence, Ran exclaimed, "NO!" She was not going to go there so soon after Shinichi's return for fear of him disappearing once again. And so the day passed without incident.

By the time night had fallen, Shinichi felt exhausted. He said goodbye to Ran and headed home. He was just about to pass through the gate to his house when he remembered that somebody else was living there for now. Well, maybe he could meet that person later. He felt too exhausted to meet someone for the first time right now. He walked away from his house and entered Professor Agasa's.

It was rather late, so Shinichi was surprised when he saw that Conan was still up. Weren't little kids supposed to go to bed earlier? But Professor Agasa seemed fine with it.

"Oh, Shinichi, you're back," Professor Agasa said when he heard the door open. He had been working on some strange device. Shinichi couldn't guess what it might be.

"Huh?" Conan asked, looking up from watching the professor invent. Then he saw Shinichi and said, "Oh, okaeri, Shinichi-niichan!"

"Tadaima," Shinichi replied. "I'm exhausted. If it's alright with you, I'm gonna go to bed."

"Hm? Okay," Professor Agasa replied, distracted with his inventing.

After Shinichi went upstairs and was out of earshot, Conan asked the professor, "Is it done yet?"

"Not yet, Shinichi," he replied, "It won't be done for a couple hours yet. Why don't you go to bed while you're waiting? It'll be ready in the morning."

"Hai," Conan said, sighing. Then he went upstairs after Shinichi.

Shinichi forced open his tired eyes. Something had woken him up. He sat up and looked around himself. It was still dark out. Wondering what could have awoken him, Shinichi reached for his phone to see what time it was.

_Oh, that's right,_ he thought when he couldn't see the time, _My phone broke._ Then he remembered that the little kid, Conan-kun, had a watch. Careful not to disturb the sleeping Conan, Shinichi reached over to look at the watch. Just as he was about to touch it to see it better, the seemingly loud crash of something falling onto the floor downstairs stopped him.

"Dare da?!" Shinichi asked loudly. There was no response. He looked down at Conan, surprised that he was still sleeping after the crash and Shinichi's question. Shrugging, he slowly got up and walked out of his room.

Making sure not to make a sound, Shinichi crept along the hallway and found a stray soccer ball. He picked it up, just in case he needed to attack the intruder with something. He continued walking down the stairs, careful of what he might find.

He winced as he accidentally put his weight on a creaky step. Still, there was no noise in response. Not even the shuffling of feet as someone tried to get away. Strange, if someone was down here, there would have been some sort of noise. Unless, of course, that person was lying in wait.

There was nobody at the bottom of the stairs. Shinichi silently moved toward the front door. Now he saw what had made the noise. A vase had fallen and broken on the floor. The window next to it was open and cold air flowed in. Maybe that was why there had been no responses earlier, because the culprit had already escaped.

Shinichi looked around to see if anything had been stolen. After searching for a while, he found that nothing had. Or maybe there was something, but he didn't know about it. Finally, he came back to the room where the vase had fallen and started picking up the pieces. As he threw away the last piece, a sudden, high-pitched noise startled him. He looked around and relaxed as he saw a smoky black cat standing on the counter where the vase had been.

"So are you our little troublemaker then?" Shinichi asked her. The cat meowed again in response. "Come here," he said, lifting her up and holding her in his lap. He ran his fingers through her soft fur. "What are you doing here then?" The cat struggled to get out of his grasp and he let her climb out. She started walking toward the hallway, but then turned around and meowed at Shinichi.

"What is it?" he asked her. She meowed again. Shrugging, he got up and followed her.

She led him through the hallway and scratched at the door to the basement. Shinichi opened it for her and she slipped lightly down the stairs. He walked down as well. Once in the basement, she immediately walked across the basement, every once in a while looking back to see if Shinichi was still following, and sat down facing the wall opposite the basement entrance. She waited until Shinichi was right beside her and meowed up at him.

"What?" he asked. She looked up at him, then straight at the wall, then back up at him again, then back at the wall, then back up at him again. "What?" he asked again. She stood up on her hind legs and scratched at the wall. She stopped and looked up at Shinichi again.

He looked at her, confused. _It's almost as if she wants me to open a door. But that's a wall, not a door._ As he was thinking this, small amount of dust fell in front of him. _Wait a minute,_ he thought, looking up, _Is that . . . ?_ He closely examined the wall the cat was once again scratching. Yes, it was. A crack in the wall (no, not the one in Doctor Who). But it wasn't a normal crack that you might find, but a completely straight, vertical crack. His eyes followed it, and it connected to another straight but horizontal crack, which in turn connected to another vertical line, parallel to the first. An almost invisible crack hidden in the corner line connecting the wall and floor completed the figure.

_That looks like . . ._ Shinichi trailed off. He pushed the rectangle. Nothing happened. The cat meowed at him again. He pushed harder. Dust fell down as it moved a centimeter. _Well, wherever this leads to,_ he thought, for he had already guessed that it was a door, _it hasn't been used in a long time._ With a last final push, the hidden door scraped open. But before he could do anything else, two small streaks of gray flashed out past Shinichi. Startled, he turned around and found two kittens cuddling up with their mother.

"Oh, so that's why you wanted me to follow you," he said to the cat. She meowed up at him in thanks and left the room, the two kittens trailing behind.

Once they left, Shinichi turned back to the gaping open door that had been hidden in the wall. He wondered if Professor Agasa knew about this. He was about to enter the dark room that the door led to when some sinister feeling made him hesitate. Finally, he decided to go back to his room and think about it later.

After he left, the door slowly grated close . . .

Unawares to what happened after he left, Shinichi went upstairs back into his room.

_Oh yeah,_ he thought, _I forgot to check what time it was._ Once again being careful not to wake Conan up, he checked the watch on the boy's wrist: 1:39 A.M. Satisfied, he was about to go back to bed, but hesitated. He smelled something that would be odd to find in Professor Agasa's house. He couldn't quite place what it was, but it somehow reminded him of a hospital. And it seemed to be coming from Conan's watch.

He looked closer at the watch. Unknowingly, his finger brushed up against a button and the top flung open. That was weird, there seemed to be markings on the lid, almost like an aimer. Trying to examine it without waking its owner up, Shinichi held it by the sides of the face of the watch, the lid facing up at him. He felt his finger press something on the watch. Then he saw a small flash of movement and felt a short, sharp prick on the side of his neck. His hand immediately went there and he pulled out and looked at something not unlike a needle.

Suddenly, a wave of fatigue came over him. He sat - or rather collapsed - down on his bed, finally remembering what that smell had been: a powerful kind of anesthetic. Then everything went black as his body fell completely down, lying on the bed.

* * *

_**Shinichi learns about Conan's watch: the hard way. Now what'll Shinichi think of him? Having weird glasses . . . having a voice-changing bowtie with the voices of people he knew in it . . . having a watch with anesthetic in it powerful enough to knock someone out within a few seconds . . . a 6-year-old kid shouldn't have those things (however, Conan is decidedly not a 6-year-old kid) **_

_**About the door . . . I'm probably eventually going to explain it, maybe in the next chapter, but I originally put it in there to make the chapter longer. But now there's a different degree of mystery to the story :D Oh yeah, I can't forget about the invention Professor Agasa is making for Conan either. **_

_**Ja ne! **_


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